[bearoutwest]

Fatigue as a primary source of airframe failure in operational WW2 aircraft? I doubt if any WW2 era aircraft achieved anywhere near normal flight cycle loading – except maybe for the long haul transports C-46, C-47, C-54, during the war years.

My discussion of the cyclic style loading was to highlight the area of concern – i.e. the fuselage just aft of the wing trailing edge on the Fw200. I would have thought that the flight regimes contributing to overall wear and damage would have been (in no particular order of importance, as each individual aircraft would have differed):
- high g-load flight manoeuvres (Fw200s used initially for low level bombing of ships with high-ish g-load pull up at end of bomb-run)
- heavy landings
- cyclic loads due to heavy operational loads
- combat damage (holes in stressed skin would require airframe structure to take a higher portion of load).

As for operational loading of the Fw200:
Civil and military transports:
- passenger seating from aft of cockpit to just after trailing edge of wing
- small mail/baggage compartment in nose, and towards tail of aircraft (remember that passengers and baggage weighed in this era of air transport, so 23kg suitcases and 10kg duty free goods per passenger was not allowed)
- fuel tanks in the wing, possibly temporary fuel tanks in fuselage but this may have only been for the early long range civil air route demonstration flights.

Military recce/bomber versions:
- bomb-bay (small/medium size items) in underfuselage gondola (about the same location as the wing)
- large bombs on wing or back of outboard engine nacelle
- fuel tankage in wings and in fuselage (where civil passenger seating used to be)
- additional operational items – gun turrets, ammunition, etc distributed through out aircraft

As for Robert’s question of replacing the Fw200 with something else:
- Fw200 originally used – quite effectively – as maritime recce/low & medium level anti-shipping bomber. So it reported the convoys, gathered the U-Boats and made it’s own attacks.
- As shipboard AA guns increased in number and as firstly CAM-ships (with the one use Sea Hurricane catapult fighters) and subsequently escort carriers with reusable deck fighters, the Fw200 was used less as an attacking bomber and more as a pure recce aircraft.
- Ju90/290 aircraft would supplement the Fw200s, but there were never enough of these to totally replace the Fw200.
- He177 and Do217 aircraft would be used more as an shipping attack bomber (especially with the Hs293 and Fritz-X controlled guide bombs)
- As a military transport, the Luftwaffe had Ju52 and Fw200 for most of the war, supplemented later by Me323, early He111s and beute-aircraft like the French LeO 451 and Italian Sm82. As I understand it, there was never sufficient transports available to replace the Fw200.

So essentially, the Fw200 soldiered on……….(until shot down or it’s tail fell off). A number of Royal Navy carrier pilots did note the tail coming off the Fw200 while under attack. I don’t recall whether this was directly due to combat manoeuvres overstressing the rear fuselage, whether from combat damage or perhaps a combination. (I will see if I can dig out the relevant incidents, but it may take awhile.)


Regards,
...geoff